HEART THOUGHTS from Helen

"A Lesson from a Puppy"

"I have hidden Your Word in my heart that I might not sin against You." Psalm 119:11 (NIV)

We have a new canine cousin to complete our extended family. Our oldest granddaughter, Catie, received her birthday present early. She's wanted a puppy since their previous dog Duke died several months ago. Duke, a lab, husky mix from Alaska, truly exhibited all the traits of a good family pet. Duke was a good dog. He'd been shuffled around many times in many ways and always loved his master and family. After a proper time of grieving, our youngest son, Todd, agreed to this rescue pup for Catie. They went to the Humane Society to search for the proper pup. The result is "Lizzie", a twelve week old Dalmatian mix. Lizzie, whom Catie says, 'called to her' from her kennel, is now a part of the Lynn canine enclave. In my eleven year old granddaughter's words, "Lizzie seemed content to be alone but also wanted to be loved." Our other son, David has two rescued dogs: Rugby, a yellow lab and Toby, a black dog of undetermined origin belonging to Jacob their eleven year old.

This pup is nothing like the pups in our past. She's been to visit a few times and I am so enthralled with watching our twenty-two month old golden retriever, Sadie, and Lizzie. They do what I call a dog dance. After checking each other out all over they have become the best of friends and have a ball. In the dance, our Sadie is the jitter-bugger and Lizzie is the slow dancer. They pounce and play and stop on a dime and twirl around and race off to another part of the house or yard.

One of Sadie's newest play toys is an orange hard rubber bone. She hasn't taken to it vigorously yet, but Lizzie decided she liked it. On our trip outdoors Saturday, Lizzie took the orange bone and headed immediately for the soft dirt of my flower bed by the patio. I was sitting in my chair observing the dog dance while four little girls played inside. Lizzie proceeded to dig fast and furious with orange bone beside her. Determined to bury 'her 'bone before Sadie picked up on her stunt, she would dig and glance at Sadie who wasn't about to be left behind in this game. So, both dogs began to dig scattering dirt all over the place. If it hadn't been such a funny dance they did, I'd have been really ticked, but since I hadn't put any flowers where they were digging, I just watched, smiling.

How does a puppy know to bury a bone? Or better still, why does a dog bury a bone? Seems to me they'd chew it up rather than bury it. We've had other dogs that buried bones that we found in our back yard at a much later date. Seems a waste of a good bone to me.

Since pondering these things in my heart, I've come up with my own personal analogy. It may not be too spiritual but when I read the above verse from Psalm 119:11, I couldn't help but nod my head and think of Lizzie (Dennis calls her Elizabeth).

When I come across a particularly appropriate scripture, I want to hide it in my heart for whenever I may need it, either for myself or someone else. I often write them on index cards and carry them in my pocket or purse to dig out and hand to someone with whom I come in contact during the day. Oh, I cannot tell you the times the Lord has provided 'bones' to be gnawed on, absorbed and shared. I usually call them gems of treasure, gold, silver, precious stones mined from digging into the WORD, but in this instance, bones buried in the deep dark part of my heart seems to work for me ...and for Lizzie.